Tug of war over World Cup skier from Africa

A 21-year-old African skier has emerged as a rising star of the World Cup slalom circuit after using borrowed equipment and travelling to races in a grey VW camper van loaned by a friend.

Leyti Seck, a former computer studies student, is being fought over by his adopted homeland of Austria and his native Senegal after only two years as a professional skier. Both countries want him to race for them next season.

Seck has been picked to train with the Austrian ski team, which is dominating the present World Cup season. "I love skiing with the Austrians," he said last week, "although they often laugh at my thin legs and call me Mr Twiglet."

Seck - who has dual nationality - has so far competed for Senegal as the country's lone representative on the international circuit.

His first race with the International Ski Federation - skiing's governing body - was three months after he decided to go professional, and that was in January last year at Fugen in Tyrol, Austria. He has therefore made amazing progress in so short a time, without a professional skiing background, to have reached the top half of the 120 who started at St Moritz.

Related Articles

At the World Championships in St Moritz last week, he finished ahead of Jean-Pierre Vidal, who won an Olympic gold medal in slalom for France at Salt Lake City last year, and Ivica Kostelic, who was among the early leaders in this season's World Cup rankings. Austria's best skiers are impressed by his potential. "He has amazing talent," said Christian Mayer, a giant slalom champion. "I was really surprised at his performance."

Austria's much-loved ski champion Hermann Maier, who is known as "The Herminator" after walking away from a series of life-threatening crashes, said that Seck would benefit from training with the Austrians.

"We will get rid of his spaghetti legs and build up some real muscles," he said. "Then I expect he will really show us what he can do." Seck, born in Munich to a German mother and Senegalese father, was adopted as a child. After a spell in an orphanage he went to live in Austria with a foster mother, Maria Leitner.

Already a keen amateur skier, Seck turned professional after she saw a report on a Kuwaiti competitor in skiing's World Championships. "If he can do it," she joked, "why can't you?" Within 24 hours, Seck was in touch with the federation in Switzerland, asking how he could compete in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. Although he was not eligible for the Olympics, he was spotted by the president of the Senegalese Ski Federation, Lamine Gueye, who was working as an instructor in France.

He registered Seck as a World Cup skier for Senegal. At the same time, he was invited to start training with the Austrian squad.

"Having the chance to compete alongside the greats like Hermann Maier, Stephan Eberharter and Benjamin Raich has shown me how far I have to go," he said last week.

"Sometimes a World Championship title is as far away as the moon from the Earth. But I am a fighter, and when I look how far I have come I know I can make it. I am not a black Hermann Maier yet, but by training with the Austrians I have learned so much and improved a lot. Anything is possible now."

Seck fought a ban imposed by the FIS that barred him from competing with an anti-racism logo on his helmet. It will be auctioned by Amnesty International at the end of the season to help raise funds to sponsor more African skiers.

"When I was younger and in a home I was always being teased by the other kids for my dark skin," said Seck. "I hated those jokes. But that's over. I never need to cry anymore."